Former Prime Minister Ehud Barak suggested today (Tuesday) in a Twitter thread on the judicial reform controversy that Israel possesses nuclear weapons.
“It sounds weird to us. But in Israelis’ conversations with political parties in the West, their deep concern emerges about the possibility that, if the coup d’&eacutetat in Israel succeeds, a messianic dictatorship will be established in the heart of the Middle East, possessing nuclear weapons, and which fanatically wishes for a confrontation with Islam centered on the Temple Mount. In their eyes – it’s really scary. It’s not going to happen. Have a happy holiday,” Barak wrote.
Barak’s comments, while merely stating that other countries are afraid of what a more religious Israel with nuclear weapons would look like rather than outright stating that Israel possesses such weapons, violated the principle of strategic ambiguity by which Israel does not confirm or deny its possession of nuclear weapons and refuses to be the first nation to introduce them into the Middle East.